Wishlist
by hiding duh
Summary: Sylar, Claire. Maybe he passed.


Scribbled hastily for **linsadair**, 'cause she texted me into it, the demon.

**Title**: Wishlist  
**Fandom**: Heroes  
**Characters/Pairings**: Sylar, Claire  
**Summary**: Maybe he passed.  
**Rating**: PG  
**Spoilers**: Pass/Fail.  
**Word Count**: 1,300  
**Notes**: Oh, good lord, so much sap, I'm sorry. To go with this song, okay. (The White Stripes - We're Going To Be Friends)

* * *

This is how it could happen:

Universe #23. He goes to Matt, dethrones Samuel, gives up his powers, dies by Peter's hand. Claire lives happily ever after.

Universe #31. He goes to Samuel, steals his power, brings down half the country. He never sees Claire again.

Universe #74. He goes to Claire, forces her along, spends a lifetime on the run. Claire doesn't forgive him.

Universe #99. He goes to Hiro, splits his head open, and fixes everything.

Somewhere in all those alternate universes, there's a closet.

He says: "I can't kill, I can't understand anything, and I don't want to be alone."

They exchange a look, and then she rises.

"I'm tired, Claire."

Her hand pauses on the doorknob.

"And I don't know what to do."

She opens the door. "Man up, Sylar," she throws over her shoulder. "No one does."

*

2012, and she comes to find him.

"So, hey," she says casually, "the world's ending in a week."

He looks up from his coffee. "Really? That's why you called me?"

The waitress eyes them warily.

Claire plops down opposite him, splaying her hands on the table. "The world's ending in a week, Sylar."

He watches her for a moment, then returns his attention to his book. "Five days, seventeen hours, and roughly ten minutes." He glances at her over his glasses. "If you believe in that sort of thing."

She drums her nails on the table, staring at his coffee mug. "So, if the world blows up or... whatever the hell the Maya predicted, what happens to us?" Her leather jacket squeaks against the armrest. "Do we just float in space, bursting every few seconds because of the atmospheric pressure and then reassembling and then constantly getting strokes and aneurysms and—"

"Are you taking a physics class?"

Claire draws a circle on the table. "Possibly." She sighs. "Gretch's making me."

He pauses, closing his book and smirking. "The world's not going to end," he tells her, adding under his breath, "unfortunately."

She narrows her eyes. "If you're lying, I'll never forgive you."

Calm, he opens his book again. "You forgave me for killing your parents. Excuse me if I don't take you seriously."

After a beat, she shrugs. "If the world does explode, can you... can _we_ fly to another planet?"

"No."

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah."

*

He drops by her dorm in 2014.

"I'm thinking about having kids."

She rubs her eyes with a yawn, sticking a post-it note to her monitor. "What? Can you do that? Are shapeshifters able to carry their own—"

He flicks two fingers, and her textbooks fly across the room. "No, Claire, I still need a healthy woman to reproduce."

"Gross," she says, collecting her books. "Well. I have finals. Good luck to you with..." she points at her window impatiently, "...all that stuff."

"Claire."

She sighs, placing the books on her desk. "You can't be serious."

He leans against the doorway and grins. "Too soon?"

"Sylar," the corners of her lips twitch, "_never_ would be too soon."

*

Bennet kicks the bucket at the dawn of 2016.

"That's your stepmom?" he asks Claire with a smug grin. "Huh."

She steps away from the blank tombstone and the rain-soaked mourners, and tugs him behind a fat tree. "Shut up." Suspicious, she scrunches up her face. "What do you want?"

"Just checking."

"...up on me?" she finishes slowly.

"That he's really dead."

*

"My father died," he tells her, 2018.

Startled, Claire squints at the shadows, but doesn't stop walking. "Did you kill him?"

He falls into step next to her. "No."

She chances a glance at him. "Are you sad?"

"No."

She stops, absentmindedly readjusts his collar, and purses her lips. "Here's your orphan membership card," she nods, slipping an imaginary note into his pocket.

*

2020, and he feels restless.

He misses the food, the books, the clothes, misses the things that made sense, even when they didn't.

"I have no idea what I'm doing."

He looks at her, and sighs. "So?"

She slumps against him on the couch, unladylike. "There isn't a class I haven't taken, a job I haven't tried." She stares off into space, tapping her knees. "I'm out of ideas."

He raises a suggestive eyebrow.

"...I'm not _that_ bored," she scoffs.

*

She calls him up, still 2020.

"Be here in fifteen," she orders, then hangs up.

He ports over, annoyed. "Claire, I'm not your personal—"

"I said fifteen!" she growls, blindly groping for a towel.

Her cheeks are flushed, so Sylar smirks. "What do you need?"

"You," she says and his chest sort of tightens, "to turn around."

Flippant, he does, tossing a soap bottle in the air a few times. "Other than trying to seduce me, what do you want?"

She spins him around, one hand clutching a towel. "Kiss me."

He hesitates. "What?"

There's a sparkly obnoxious thing in her eyes. "_I_ don't know what I want, but _you_ can show me, Sylar. Right?"

Sure, he still has Lydia's power, but—

Well. What the hell.

He slants his lips over hers, and yes, it's different when she's not about to stab him in the eye. He hopes.

"So?" she asks, breathless. "Let's see it."

He glances at his arm, then quickly slaps his palm over the tattoo.

"...this doesn't work for me," he mumbles, and bails.

*

She tracks him down once a week.

He doesn't understand how. He checks his clothes for some sort of GPS device, and eventually gives up, mostly because she keeps trying to kiss him.

"Is it something weird?" she asks carefully, poised to press her lips against his. "Is that why you're not showing me?"

Yeah, that's why.

"Very weird," he agrees, cups her face, and turns her away.

*

In 2022, she starts playing dirty.

Her boyfriend is some mutant guy with a useless ability, and she says, "Well, you told me to tear down my walls, Reagan." She bites down on a deformed muffin. "Do you know people don't get this reference anymore? Sad."

He mulls it over, watching her with care. "I didn't say you should marry Aquaman," he drawls. "Another reference I'm guessing no one understands? Further disheartening."

"Alex is nice," she shrugs.

"I liked Gretchen better," he muses.

Her lips quirk up. "I bet." She fixes her eyes on his. "So, gonna show me?"

"No."

*

When she doesn't marry Aquaman by 2024, Sylar decides maybe. Maybe, yes.

"Seriously?" she grumbles, skeptical. "You'll finally show me?"

He raises an eyebrow in invitation.

Yes, he doesn't have to kiss her, but no, seriously, she doesn't need to know that.

"Okay," she inhales, taking a step closer. "If you chicken out again, I'll stab you."

Surreptitiously, he checks her hands for pens, pencils, and other scholastic equipment. "I'll show you. Just don't complain."

Her eyes narrow pleasantly. "Shut up."

There's a kiss, and then she's wiping her mouth, quickly rolling up his sleeve. "Oh."

He glances at the tattoo. It doesn't look much like him, but it should be pretty obvious to her that it's definitely his face. "Hmm. Sorry."

She frowns, looking up at him. "What?"

"I know it's not what you expected—"

Her frown deepens. "Really? I figured _that_ out five years ago." Contemplative, she pats his arm. "I just didn't think the tattoo would be so ugly. Your eyebrows look like caterpillars."

His heart is racing. "_Five_ years ago?"

She backs away, smirking. "Well. It's not like I'm in a hurry."

He catches her wrist. "Yeah. Me, neither."

Hey.

It's a start.


End file.
